The Economics of Happiness to Screen at the San Francisco Public Library, April 4

The Economics of Happiness, an award-winning new documentary by Helena Norberg-Hodge, Steven Gorelick and John Page, describes a world moving simultaneously in two opposing directions from globalization to localization. The film will be screened Wednesday, April 4, 5;45 p.m. at the San Francisco Main Library, 100 Larkin St.

The documentary explores how government and big business continue to promote globalization and the consolidation of corporate power. At the same time, all around the world, people are resisting those policies, demanding a re-regulation of trade and finance. Far from the old institutions of power, individuals are starting to forge a very different future. Communities are coming together to re-build more human scale, ecological economies based on a new paradigm–the economics of happiness.

Five years in the making,The Economics of Happiness is considered a global tour-de-force that goes beyond identifying problems to outline realistic solutions, drawing inspiration from the emerging worldwide movement for economic localization: from urban gardens in Detroit to hands-on education in Japan, from community farming in India to cultural preservation in Peru. The film shows that the solutions to the most pressing environmental, economic and social crises can simultaneously improve our quality of life.

The Economics of Happiness features acclaimed economists, environmentalists and scholars including Vandana Shiva, Zac Goldsmith, Bill McKibben, David Korten, Juliet Schor, Richard Heinberg, Bhutanese film director Khyentse Norbu, and the first Prime Minister of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, Samdhong Rinpoche.

“It is good news indeed to find so persuasive an explanation of our ailing world asThe Economics of Happiness. This film connects the dots between climate chaos, economic meltdown, and our own personal suffering—stress, loneliness, and depression,” said author and philosopher Joanna Macy.